Informal Communities of Change

Resourceful Living

I'd like you to hold the following idea for a minute or two, and we'll come back to it:
I need a secure bed for myself and my garden.

We Are Here

There is a lot of "we" here on this island, and that's not just a notion. We claim a place. We share proximity. But, I think that word "proximity" is too vague, so is "place." Not enough "people" in those words. "People" is even a little too general. Maybe it's "interactions" or "relationships." But, the annual shark tournament is interactive — in a self-interested sort of way.

Housing: Permanent Affordable Resource

Resourceful Living

For many people who live on Martha's Vineyard there is a sharp contrast between the quality of life and the cost of living. The people who live here year round are closely knit. There is a slower pace and an even tempo to the way we engage each other — something is shown in each gesture, and something gathered in observation. We live in a beautiful place, and that doesn't go without saying. However, it is said simply — in the ways we can catch a deep conversation in passing, and then in passing let it go.

First Energy Lesson: End Waste

Resourceful Living

By Tye Stien: MVRHS Graduate

A recent British study has shown that electricity derived from coal power loses over 78% of its energy in its journey from furnace to floorboard. This underlines not only the inefficiency of our powergrid but of our outlook towards energy.

Samsø Denmark, Martha's Vineyard & Energy Independence

Resourceful Living

By Suzanne Slarsky-Dael

This windy Danish city (which I called home until January) has been preparing for the December summit for years. The official Danish government strategy has been refined and polished and refined again, and the people of Copenhagen have been readying their city to demonstrate how a high standard of living can be achieved with a high proportion of renewable energy - 19 percent in Denmark's case.

Rose Abrahamson – Martha's Vineyard Artist

I conjure up "spirits from the vasty deep." Perhaps every painter seeks, through the medium of art, to explore what it means to be human. For me that inquiry has been conducted with whatever material comes to hand, be it paint collage, found objects or ephemeral material such as leaves and twigs. Leonardo de Vinci advised painters who lacked inspiration to contemplate with a reflective eye the cracks in an old wall. He said there is a map of the universe in the lines that time draws on these old walls.

Elizabeth Cecil Martha's Vineyard Photographer

I am infatuated with light and its relationship to a subject. In my most recent work I am exploring the light, color, and objects that create the mood of a place. I like to creep around vacated summer cottages and homes of friends while they are still tucked in their beds. I find these places, with all of their particular things, oddly comforting even though they aren't my own.

I have an overwhelming affection for the past and I find these images an evocation of those feelings that we all have for places in our memories whether they are ours or not.

Susan Johnson Martha's Vineyard Artist

I have only just started exhibiting again this year, after 12 years working with computer graphics, web design. I actually had a creative block for my art during for most of this time, but came back to studio work two years ago. It has been an awesome emotional journey to regain my art, and with new strength and depth.

Technically it feels like no time has past, and I do also see how much my computer work has given me. I was print-maker as well as a painter and sculptor, and translating through medium has always been a part of my work process.

Annika Schahn — How the Principles of Sydney Banks Help

There has been a shift developing in the field of psychology for some time now, away from seeing outside factors as the cause of our experience, to a focus on our mental life. Cognitive therapy, for example, teaches people to reframe attitudes and beliefs from negative to positive, in order to have better outcomes in life. This way of viewing life — from the inside out rather than the outside in — represents a paradigm shift away from seeing our problems as being caused by outside factors, such as our genetics, past experiences or the circumstances of our lives.

WindTrigue on the Vineyard

Resourceful Living

By John Abrams
Reprinted here by permission of the Author
For more, Go to John Abrams' Blog The Company We Keep.

While the eyes of the world focus on Copenhagen, here at home on Martha’s Vineyard wind energy has been receiving a mighty dose of attention – more than ever before. Are we making progress? Maybe some. You be the judge.

Carrie Mae Smith — Words

Intention. Line and color must be struck with intention. Not necessarily knowing the outcome, but working with deliberate intention towards a sense of something, a feeling, an idea, a sense of purpose.

In my deliberation I work to provoke thought, with out being commanding of a singular response. Painting everyday objects, things that we live with and don't give much thought to, I invite the viewer to rest on- or meditate on the simplicity of the present. Like a repose, a moment to be quiet and find contentment.